As I flew back from the Knoxville Nationals, I was thinking about the role of ambition in racing. ‘Hope’ is a lovely word, but ambition is hope backed by hard work and perseverance. Ambition is a word that seems to have horsepower and torque naturally attached to it. Ambition is an engine.

It takes ambition to be a racer. It may be a young man’s first race, but he would not have entered this sport without a driving ambition to win.

Next, the winning racer develops the ambition to win championships.

For a very few, an interesting vision occurs to them, followed by the ambition to make it happen: starting a racing business.

The racing industry is full of people who never planned to make a career in racing. If you asked them if they considered it when they were younger, many would say they’d have thought it impossible. If you ask them who encouraged them to open a racing business, many will answer, “Nobody.”

This entire industry is based on the power of ambition. Let’s go racing. Let’s keep racing. Let’s make a living racing. It’s a big dream. But, tens of thousands had the personal horsepower and torque to make it happen.

Yes, there are new challenges in racing today. There always will be. Come to the PRI Trade Show in Orlando, and you’ll meet up with tens of thousands with the ambition to rise to these challenges, and succeed. It re-energizes and remotivates you. Whether it’s the race engine parts, the chassis parts or the sanctioning bodies, it’s ambition that’s on display. The ambition to win races and championships. The ambition to meet challenges. The ambition to keep racing the most glorious of sports, with participants numbering in the hundreds of thousands.

The ambition of this dynamic racing industry can meet challenges like nobody’s business.